All Your Perfect Imperfections
by prettypinklips
Summary: He keeps sending her drawings. -– Klaus/Caroline. Complete


**All Your Perfect Imperfections**

–

He keeps sending her drawings.

–

The first comes to her dorm in a sealed yellow package. It's outside of her door when she gets back from class, waiting for her. She racks her brain, trying to remember if she'd ordered something. She unlocks the door and pushes it open, dropping her purse onto the floor. She sits on her bed, holding the package.

The return address is Louisiana. New Orleans to be exact. Her stomach churns with anticipation. There's only one person who would be sending her a package from New Orleans.

She hadn't seen him since that day in the woods. The day she had finally opened herself up to the thought of them together. But she had made him promise that it would be the first and only time. They would never see each other again. She supposes he wasn't really breaking that promise by sending her something. Her nerves make her hands shake, and she tears the package open.

Inside is a napkin with the name of some bar in New Orleans on it. She flips it over. On the other side is a drawing in blue ink. It's her, in her blue Cinderella dress with her hair pinned back. It's breathtakingly beautiful. There is no note, just the drawing.

She stares at the drawing for what feels like hours, and eventually she hears another key turn in the lock. She quickly opens the drawer to her bedside table and shoves the napkin inside. Elena comes into the room, smiling, "Hey. How was your day?" The brunette asks, dropping her bag and kicking her shoes off.

"Completely uneventful." Caroline lies smoothly. Her eyes flick to the drawer. "Wanna grab some lunch?"

–

The second drawing comes two weeks later.

It's a bigger package this time, and she tears it open as soon as she sees it. It's a charcoal drawing of the night she had played the "little blonde distraction". Her hair is undone and curled around her shoulders, and she has a small half smile on her face. It was the first real smile she had ever given him, she thinks.

He had drawn her so beautifully. The initials K.M. are penciled in at the bottom of the drawing. Her thumb brushes the letters, and for a moment she wants to cry. In this picture she is perfect.

To him, she was perfect.

She tucks the drawing into the drawer with the napkin and lays on her bed. She wonders where he is right now. If he's thinking of her.

She thinks he might be.

–

Another drawing comes the next day.

It comes to her art history class, and the student office aid calls out her name when he enters. She gets up, moving through the aisles and takes the package from her hands. Her professor gives her a stern look and she flushes and scurries back to her seat.

She opens the package quietly. It's another drawing, this time in colored pencil. Her face is not in the picture, but she knows it's her because of the bracelet. He has drawn her arm and her wrist, with the bracelet shining and sparkling. Like the others, it's beatiful.

She tucks the drawing into her binder, and zones back into her professor's lecture. But try as she may, she can't get the drawing out of her mind.

She fails the pop quiz that day.

–

She goes to the store after class and buys a scrapbook.

When she gets home she pulls out the other drawings and tucks them one by one into the scrapbook. She dates each drawing. She flips through the pages, heart in her throat.

She misses him. She misses his uncanny knack of knowing when she needed him. When she needs a laugh or she needs saving or she just needed a loving presence. She knew he adored her. She had used it to her advantage quite a few times.

But things were different between them now. There was no more denying that she felt something for him. Not anymore. She remembers graduation and the Miss Mystic Falls pageant. He had been a gentlemanly date. Even though the date had been a ploy to distract him, she had still enjoyed herself. If things had been different, if he was different and she was different and their lives were normal, she would happily go on as many dates with him as he wanted.

She closes the book with a snap. But things weren't different. They were the same. She puts the book in her drawer and doesn't revisit it for a week.

–

The next picture takes her breath away.

It's a painting this time, and she thinks it's his best yet. It's her, her back pushed against a tree. Her eyes are hooded and even she can see the pure lust in them. Her lips are parted and painted a soft pink. Her blouse is torn open, revealing her bra and cleavage.

It's their day in the woods. She puts a hand over her mouth, covering her gasp. She is in awe. She had never felt more pretty.

It's in that moment that she decides to take a trip. Her whole life would change. But she doesn't want his hands on paper anymore. She wants them on her. Only her.

So she goes to New Orleans.

–

(The only thing she packs is the scrapbook.)

–

As she drives into town, she can see why Klaus likes this place. It's beautiful, all old buildings and jazz music and gorgeous women.

She rolls down her window, and almost instantly, she picks up his scent. He is everywhere. She revels in it for a moment before she presses her foot down on he pedal once more, following her nose to him.

She comes to a house in the heart of the city, and she knows it's his because it's ornate and immaculately kept and the flowers are blooming in full swing.

She parks her car on the street and gets out, in awe of the house. She thinks she might love it here. She knocks on the door and waits, but she gets no answer. She tries the doorhandle and the door opens with a creak.

She hesitantly steps into the house, and casts her eyes around. Nobody seems to be home. The house is adorned with what appear to be Persian rugs and deep reds and old wooden furniture.

She steps into the foyer, moves towards the hall. "Hello?" She calls. "Klaus?"

No answer.

She supposes she'll just have to find his bedroom and wait for him there. She prays Rebekah nor Elijah aren't home. That would be an awkward conversation she wasn't ready for. Klaus was probably out maiming the townspeople and scaring the children anyway. She hoped he would be back soon.

She takes the first door on the left, and once she's inside, she is speechless.

There are hundreds of drawings and paintings, in all different shapes and sizes.

All of her.

She picks up one drawing, but doesn't have time to examine it because the door opens behind her.

"Caroline?" A familiar voice breathes.

She whips around, and there he is.

He looks the same, but she sees little differences. Differences that someone who didn't know him as well as she did wouldn't notice. His stubble and his eyes and his necklaces and his attire are the same, but he looks old. He had never looked old to her before. He looks tired and pale and–she knows that look. She'd worn it many times herself. He looks completely and utterly heartbroken. And maybe that's how she'd looked everyday since he'd left and taken everything she had with him.

"I thought I heard your voice, but I told myself that it couldn't be you. It would never be you. But you're here." He says softly. His eyes are smiling but his mouth is not.

"I'm here." She echoes. She doesn't think she's ever going to leave again. "You look like hell." She says. She doesn't know what else to say.

He tilts his head, and the ghost of a smile passes over his lips. Before, he would have made some snippy remark and laughed. Now he just watches her. Almost as if he can't believe she's here. She can't believe it either. Then she realizes, he's waiting for her to make the first move. She sighs, running a hand through her loose hair. "What is all of this, Klaus? Why did you draw me, I don't know, seven billion times?"

"You consume me." He says simply. Her breath catches in her throat. "I tried to put you away. I tried to leave you behind. I tried to do right by you. But you are in every thought I have, every breath I take, every face I see is your face. I thought if I drew you every time I thought of you, I could get you out of my head. It obviously didn't work." He laughs bitterly, and she flinches at the lonely sound. He waves to the drawings. "These are all I have left of you. Of your smile and your beauty and your unwavering kindness. They are almost as good as the real thing." He turns away from her then, goes to the bar across the room. He pours himself a drink and downs it in one gulp.

She looks at the picture she'd been holding when he'd walked in. She is laying on the ground, leaves all around her. She is naked. Naked and beautiful. This was what he has seen when their bodies were done telling each other things they could never say out loud. It hurts her heart. She realizes, for maybe the fiftieth time, that he was truly in love with her. Without even meaning to, she had tamed the beast.

He's pouring himself another drink, and she flashes towards him, taking the glass and the tumbler from his hands. She has already admitted to herself and to him that she feels something for him. Maybe not love, but she so easily could love him. Falling in love with Klaus would be as easy as falling asleep. She sets the glass and the tumbler down onto the bar, and then she puts her hands on either side of his face. His hollow blue eyes pierce hers. Her heart aches at how empty they seem. The fire has died.

It's up to her to rekindle it.

"You've got to stop drawing me. People are going to start thinking you're obsessed." She teases lightly. He gives no reaction in the face, but he flinches slightly. Like she had hurt him. "I didn't mean it like that." She backtracks. "I just mean–I mean this isn't going to be easy." She drops her hands from his face. "It's going to be really hard, and we're never ever ever going to be perfect. Or functional. Or normal. God forbid."

His eyes turn suspicious. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying I missed you every second of every minute after you made me that promise." She says boldly. She takes his hands. His fingers willingly tangle with hers. She takes it as a good sign, though he still looks weary. "I'm saying...you don't need to draw me anymore, because I'm right here. Right here with you."

And she has more to say, a whole speech, but he grabs her and knocks the glasses and the tumbler off of the bar and throws her on top of it. And as his lips find hers and her blouse is torn open once more, she finds that her skin crawls. With pleasure. Her legs hooks around his waist, and she is lost in the feeling of pure bliss and pure unadulterated love and adoration.

–

He is gone the next morning when she wakes, but there is a drawing on the pillow beside her head.

It's her in the study, with all of his other drawings surrounding her.

It's her favorite.

–

A/N: so this is sort of incoherent but I like it a lot. S6 doesn't exist and neither does that Caroline knock off Camille. Hope you enjoyed!


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